When it comes to overlanding, no matter what, you get down and dirty! Okay, okay… get your minds out of the gutter, not that type of dirty. Some of us like to rough it and just stay dirty, some of us may use baby wipes and freshen up before bed, but… me, I like a nice hot shower to rinse off and refresh. After a long day on the trails or even just a few hours of sitting near the campfire eating s’mores or waiting for your delicious cobbler/cinnamon rolls to finish in your dutch oven, nothing feels better than a warm shower. For those men who are just starting out and trying to talk your wife into this incredible hobby, you will receive extra points for having a hot shower available to her. Yeah, there may be tons of different portable shower systems, but this is about the Coleman Hot Water On Demand H2Oasis.
So what exactly is it, how does it work, and why am I discussing it? Well, the Coleman H2Oasis is like a tankless instant water heater in your home. It runs off of propane and gets you really hot water in no time, reaching its max at 125°F! It is very simple to set up by just connecting the two silicon hoses (6ft), dropping the pump in any 5 gallon water can, connecting your 16.4 oz propane tank, igniting it, and dialing in your temperature. It works great when it is charged up. Yes, unfortunately, I said charged up. It has a built-in lithium-ion battery that is charged from your 12V car charger that powers the electric pump. Coleman states it is perfect for washing dishes, making hot beverages, or showering during outdoor adventures. I’m gonna be honest and say its almost perfect, overall a good buy, and is a great addition to anyone’s overlanding setup.
The Good:
- Straightforward and simple to operate (once you read the instructions)
- You get very hot water, very quickly, which is more convenient than a solar shower bag.
- Lightweight and easy to move around.
- Fairly small and rugged for easy storage.
- You get to take a hot shower or give your pet one while out in the field, camping, or just getting dirty around the house.
- You could use it at home in case of an emergency.
- Uses very little propane, which allows the propane to outlast the battery.
- I get really frustrated when I’m taking a shower and don’t have enough pressure to get conditioner out of my long hair. So one of my requirements when searching for a portable shower, is will it have enough pressure? The pressure is preset and is actually quite strong, meeting my needs nicely.
The Bad:
- It is recommended to charge it a full 6 hours before your first use.
- It only came with a standard 12v male socket for charging, there is an optional wall charger available for purchase separately.
- It isn’t really on demand. There is no way to shut off the water while in use. So you either have to turn the unit off and restart it or do what we do and put the showerhead back in the water to continuously cycle and not waste water, while you scruba dub dub.
- It is not completely self-contained, you have to have 16.4 oz propane handy and a water can, which most of us have that anyway. Purchasing the carrying bag, will at least allow you to have two propane bottles with you.
- You have to recharge the pump after about 4-10 minute showers.
- It has a lot of safety features, which is nice; however, it was slightly frustrating figuring them out on our first camping trip. It might have saved some frustration if we would have read the instruction book it came with.
The price:
- H2Oasis itself-$279.99 Amazon Prime shipping
- Carrying bag-$37.74
- Hose Adapter to use a garden hose for unlimited water supply. -$36.32
Great write up! I agree with everything you mentioned and have found the following solutions to a couple of the devices shortcomings.
Firstly, the main thing that grinds everyone’s gears about this unit is the need to restart the machine if the flow is interrupted and furthermore the inability to interrupt the flow to conserve water when not in use. My fix for this is quite simple and only costs about $20 in parts. I have seen others put a 3 way valve just before the shower head on the hot water output line which can be set to either send the hot water directly to the shower head or divert it down a new hose all the way back into your water source. Should you be using a self contained water source this has the added benefit of not wasting any of the energy used to heat the water as your water source itself is being raised in temperature by recirculating the water through the system. 2 drawbacks to this approach which I saw were the mess of hoses which makes the entire system more cumbersome and also a lot less portable due to all the extra lengths of hose you must run. In addition to this the business end of the hot water unit is a lot bulkier due to the added return hose and 3 way valve. What I thought would be great is to not have to have an additional valve and hose on the actual shower head end of things so what I did was used a pressure relief valve and a short piece of hose which all gets connected at the spout of the hot water supply port. My design is simple:
– Add a T fitting into the existing hot water supply hose near the base where it connects to the devices hot water output outlet.
– Off this T fitting add a piece of hose that I zip tied to water intake pipe all the way down to the water pump.
– On this new return section of hose I added a pressure relief valve. What this does is opens up when the water pressure goes over a certain PSI allowing the water to pass through the valve and back to the water supply. The trick is finding a pressure relief valve that will be triggered to open at very low PSI; typically hot water tanks etc use these fittings which are triggered in the 75-200 PSI range; for the Coleman hot water on demand we want something around 5PSI. To accomplish this I went to my local hardware store which will sell a pressure relief valve that is set at 75PSI; these are readily available and are only about 5-10 $. I then opened the valve (there is a cap that simply unscrews and a washer that holds a spring in place that simply unscrews using a flat head screwdriver). Once you have the old spring out you will see that it is quite stiff and provides quite a bit of resistance. Replace this spring with a much weaker spring that is the same length (again your hardware store should have these for about 1-3 $ each…you can experiment a bit and if needed you can simply cut a longer spring down to size). Re-assemble the pressure relief valve with the new spring and test it out! You may have to make small adjustments of the pressure relief valve (can use a screwdriver to do so) but once it is roughly dialed in, if you stop the flow of water to the shower head (can put a shut off valve or just pinch the hose to test) you should see that the increase in pressure causes the pressure relief valve to open and cause the hot water to flow through the new hose back to the supply. This ensures the pump never burns out and that the unit doesn’t cycle off all the time when flow is interrupted. If your water source reaches a high enough temp the gas will shut off at which point you can toggle the pump and just use the already hot water without the need to run the gas.
Hope this tip helps!